On Turpentine Lane(50)

His pronunciation of “a merry Christmas” had a particularly ironic spin. Looking around, I noted the complete absence of anything that acknowledged a holiday. Any holiday. I did have a menorah in the china closet, but Hanukkah had come and gone in early December without one candle lit. Here I had a roommate who was a legitimate observer of Christmas, whose father went to mass on a Saturday night, and I’d done nothing.

He asked what I was appraising so studiously.

I said, “I just decided. We’re getting a tree.” I told him that when I was in high school, I’d go to Marisol Pérez’s house where I got to put the tinsel on the branches because they knew I loved that and had no tree of my own.

He said, “Here’s the part I don’t like. We’d be that family in a G-rated movie who gets all cemented by a last-minute Christmas tree acquisition.”

“I love those movies.”

“Of course you would. No Christmas baggage weighing you down.”

By now, he’d picked up the remote and snapped off the TV, but still hadn’t said yes or no to my invitation. “Dinner?” I tried again.

“I could do that.”

“Then we get the tree and ornaments? Or before?”

“No, too much work for tonight.”

“Bringing home a tree is too much work?”

“Only in the movies is it no sweat. The perfect family buys a perfect tree, then magically it’s all set up and looks like it could be on the White House lawn. Their singing—I’m guessing “Silent Night”—swells and the camera pulls back. It’s snowing. Roll credits. In real life, it’s a job. We’ll need the stand, the lights, the ornaments—”

“The tinsel.”

“The tinsel. Too much work on a Saturday night. Especially for a girl in fancy clothes. Let’s do it tomorrow.”

“Go change,” I said, “just in case we can get a table at La Grotta. I’ll call right now.”

“Use my name,” he said.



I was in my coat, reservation secured, waiting at the front door as he made his way downstairs. My first glimpse of his lower half showed him still in jeans, then, as he descended farther, I saw he’d put on his tuxedo jacket. “Very smart,” I said, at the same time wondering, What’s this about?

I told him they had a table in fifteen minutes and how perfect was that . . . as long as La Grotta wasn’t going to make him uncomfortable.

“You mean was La Grotta our place?”—air quotes around the last two words.

“Just sayin’. Whoever answered there sounded very happy to hear the name Franconi.”

“They’re good at that,” he said.



When we two were led to a good-size table for four, Nick asked, “Anything smaller?”

“Of course, of course,” said the ma?tre d’. He led us to a small round table and lit its votive candle with a pocket lighter. Minutes later, before we’d even opened the menus, two small glasses of a pale raspberry-colored liquid were put before us. “Aperitivo! Compliments of Claudio,” the waiter proclaimed.

Nick raised his glass in the direction of the ma?tre d’ and nodded, smiling, at the same time he was murmuring to me, “His kids go to ECD. He doesn’t quite get that I’m not someone he needs to kowtow to instead of the other way around.”

I raised my glass in the same direction. “He’s getting a thank-you note on Monday.”

“Monday’s Christmas,” Nick reminded me.

Of course, that launched me back into my Christmas MO. The tree, the ornaments, all that other stuff we’d have to buy.

“Look . . . I’m not a kid. I don’t need to get all decked out,” Nick said.

“C’mon. We’ll get a scrawny tree and a few ornaments from the closest purveyor of ornaments.”

“Even that—the scrawny tree. Charlie Brown’s? What else—you’ll be stringing popcorn?”

“Yes, and cranberries. Plus those chili pepper lights the Pérezes had.”

The waiter was approaching. I said, “We need another minute or two.”

“No, we don’t,” said Nick. “May I?”

May he what? I said, “I guess so.”

“Hmmm. Okay. The veal with artichokes. And the eggplant parm. You like eggplant, right? We’ll share a pasta to start. Bolognese okay with you?”

“Very okay.”

We ordered wine, a red from Sicily, the name of which Nick pronounced beautifully. And then, over our first pour, he said, “Now, the high point of Stuart’s party, the grand finale, which you were saving for dinner. Will I want to hear it?”

I said, “It had nothing to do with Brooke. It was pure Stuart.”

“About brotherhood and sisterhood and planets aligning?”

“Just the opposite. It was all about him.”

“Let me guess. He found a publisher for his book.”

I’d forgotten about Stuart’s alleged book, which was undoubtedly in the first person, undoubtedly horrible, in text-message English, doodled between scheduling appointments and collecting copays. I said no, not that.

“Good news? Bad news?”

“Brace yourself,” I said.

“Quite the buildup. You’d better deliver.”